The Scotsman reports, "Events were held across the world yesterday [Saturday], including Britain, to mark the 1,000th day in prison for an American soldier arrested and charged over the alleged leaking of classified documents to whistleblowing website WikiLeaks." Monday April 5, 2010, WikiLeaks released US military video of a July 12, 2007 assault in Iraq. 12 people were killed in the assault including two Reuters journalists Namie Noor-Eldeen and Saeed Chmagh. Monday June 7, 2010, the US military announced that they had arrested Bradley Manning and he stood accused of being the leaker of the video. Leila Fadel (Washington Post) reported in August 2010 that Manning had been charged -- "two charges under the Uniform Code of Military Justice. The first encompasses four counts of violating Army regulations by transferring classified information to his personal computer between November and May and adding unauthorized software to a classified computer system. The second comprises eight counts of violating federal laws governing the handling of classified information." In March, 2011, David S. Cloud (Los Angeles Times) reported that the military has added 22 additional counts to the charges including one that could be seen as "aiding the enemy" which could result in the death penalty if convicted. The Article 32 hearing took place in December. At the start of this year, there was an Article 32 hearing and, February 3rd, it was announced that the government would be moving forward with a court-martial. Bradley has yet to enter a plea and has neither affirmed that he is the leaker nor denied it. The court-martial was supposed to begin before the November 2012 election but it was postponed until after the election so that Barack wouldn't have to run on a record of his actual actions.
The Daily Mail reports, "Campaigners gathered outside the United States Embassy in London on Saturday in support of a US soldier arrested over the leaking of classified documents to whistleblowing website WikiLeaks. The protest was organised to mark Private Bradley Manning's 1,000th day in prison without trial." BBC adds, "Events have been held across the UK, and the rest of the world, to mark the 1,000th day spent in prison by alleged Wikileaks source Bradley Manning."
It would have been nice if the United States left could have gotten its act together. Clearly today was an important day for Bradley Manning.
And the mood for protest could have been primed and pumped if worthless rags like The Nation and The Progressive and so many other useless outlets which believe 'independent' mean either whoring for Barack Obama's offensive policies or, if they can no longer hold their nose (like at The Progressive increasingly) distracting by calling Republicans names.
In England, the 10th anniversary of the February 15, 2003 protests drew weeks and weeks of coverage recently. In the US, the protest couldn't even be noted.
That's only one segment that failed.
Today should have been about Bradley.
Bradley's not accused of raping anyone.
Bradley's not a fugitive on the lam.
There was no reason for Julian Assange's more ridiculsou and nutty supporters to insist upon opening their uninformed and stupid mouths this week. They should have stayed out of the way so the week could be about Bradley.
But that would be too much, now wouldn't?
Do the whores like Naomi Wolf ever get how ridiculous they look? Probably not, she's on so many drugs these days. But next time they're name checking or they're at an event and they dust Daniel Ellsberg off to parade him one more time, might they grasp that Daniel Ellsbeg wasn't publisher of the New York Times or the Washington Post?
They get that, right?
They're such liars it's hard to know. They're the ones who keep insisting precious Julian is just like a newspaper. Just like the newspapers that published the Pentagon Papers.
That would make Bradley the Daniel Ellsberg. Or do they not get that?
So maybe at some point, Naomi Wolf stops fingering herself while she types with one hand and moans over Little Julie Assange?
At this site, we've noted we have no idea whether Assange raped two women or not. We've noted that needs to be treated seriously.
Naomi Wolf -- who once covered a gang rape to avoid being called a "lesbo" (read her book Promescutities) -- has named them women, has trashed the women, has done nothing but damage and yet wants to present herself as a voice for rape victims and as a voice for Julian Assange.
So the tired and ugly beast Naomi Wolf decided that this was week to attack the two women again. Couldn't let Bradley have a moment in the spotlight, not Naomi. ZNet felt the perfect way to 'honor' Bradley was to trash the women who may have been raped by publishing Naomi's latest crap on them Friday.
Trashing women has been very good to Naomi. ZNet didn't give a damn about her in 2003 or 2004 or . . . But now that she can be counted on to trash two women who say they were raped, she's finally the 'left' hero she never could be in the 90s. Naomi was always jealous -- in all those debates with the author of that awful book Sexual Personae -- of the attention the author got, the support from the mainstream. Now she's discovered that, like that author, when you attack women, when you belittle issues like rape, you will be embraced by the mainstream.
Then there's the idiot Nozomi Hayase who took to CounterPunch to argue for Julian and for stupidity. The idiot writes of Assange, "As of mid February, he has been detained without charge for 802 days, 240 days at the Equadorian Embassy, due to England's unwillingness to offer safe passage."
The uninformed and uneducated should really lower their volume. Bradley Manning has now been detained 1,000 days. Julian Assange? No. "240 days at the Equadorian Embassy"? He jumped bail. Many people do -- some are guilty, some aren't. The perception is you are guilty or you wouldn't have jumped bail. If I were Julian's attorney and there was even a small chance that we'd end up in court in the next 12 months, I'd be telling his supporting to shut their damn mouths. I wouldn't need the kind of senseless frothing that Naomi and Nozomi offer. I would grasp how damaging that is.
See, the world did not embrace Julian. The world attitude currently is, "Why would he hide away in an Embassy to avoid answering questions about rape -- questions he was supposed to answer before he left Swittzerland."
That's the consensus and, as an Julian's attorney, it would be my job to know it and to grasp that Nozomi and Naomi and all the other tired hookers are hurting my client.
There will be no rousing embrace from the public if Julian and I march into court in June. It will be snickers of, "Remember when that nut case was saying his time in the Ecuadorian Embassy was the same as being behind bars?"
Naomi and Nozomi, you really need to take the crazy around to the backyard. If that's too damn difficult for you, put it on a leash.
The rape accusations harmed Julian and made him guilty in the eyes of many.
Why?
Because of the attacks on the women.
Michael Ratner needs to buy 100 damn clues. The minute you allowed and encouraged attacks on two women who may have been raped, you did not help Julian Assange.
What you demonstrated was that two possible rape victims could be beat up int he public square by his supporters. And if his supporters would do that, what would he do?
That is the question that you, John Pilger, Naomi Wolf, Ray McGovern and the rest ensured would enter the public mind.
Over a year ago, I made a promise to a friend who was working on the case that I wouldn't say Julian was guilty and wouldn't even raise the issue unless the women were attacked.
It wasn't a hard promise to make. I wasn't there. I don't know what happened. So I have no reason to say Julian Assange committed rape. By the same token though, his supporters have no reason to say the women are lying.
Now Naomi Wolf is attacking the women yet again. I guess we should all consider ourselves lucky about that. I mean, if she had any spare time she might be writing a sequel to her recent non-seller Vagina. What's next? Naomi Wolf's Colon Speaks.
It would appear it speaks quite frequently in public.
Bradley Manning is held, unlike Julian Assange. He has not sought asylum. He has been held for 1000 days. He is a political prisoner. He was long ago pronounced guilty by Barack Obama.
That should be an issue. But people don't want to make that the issue. They want to attack rape victims. Or they want to protect Barack Obama.
Margaret Flowers is part of the reason Bradley doesn't get attention. She used her time this week not to talk about issues but to trash Hillary Clinton -- a woman Flowers seems unaware is no longer even Secretary of State.
Here's how Flowers used her time this week:
What are some of the truths? There are so many. In this short newsletter, we want to focus on one – Hillary Clinton. She is the most popular woman in the world, according to polls. If she wants the presidency, the media tells us, it is hers. Yet, what do the Wikileaks documents which whistleblower Bradley Manning released show us? They show us she is not fit to be president and rather than being admired, she should be prosecuted. That will sound extreme to the ears of Americans who have had the truth hidden from them, but it is a factual statement.
If there's an argument to be made for Hillary not being president, I'm not really sure that this was the week to do so, especially if you're with an organization attempting to spotlight Bradley, which Flowers is.
She's also a dumb ass nothing who'll never amount to anything because she's so damn stupid. That's why she lost a campaign, that's why she's a loser and loser wafts off her.
Let's go into Persuasion 101. If my goal is to raise awareness and support for Bradley, do I pen a column, right before the protests, calling out someone I state "is the most popular woman in the world, according to polls." Really? That's how I get people on my side?
That's how I drum up support?
Next up, Flowers goes after Justin Bieber! Just knowing that such an attack will turn out 'the masses.'
Again, the stupidity of Flowers is appalling and has always been. She has repeatedly presented herself as an advocate over the years for this and for that and no one hurts her causes more than she does.
Again, Hillary's not even Secretary of State. There's no reason to bring her into this. Secretary of State isn't the presidency. Barack is the reason Bradley's been behind bars for over 1,000 days.
If you're going to call someone out, you call out the one responsible. Or you look like a coward. In other words, Flowers just bit into an Egg McMuffin and found a toe. So she wants to scream about the clerk who took her order and avoid calling out the one actually responsible.
That just makes Flowers a joke. And if you're a joke don't expect to be taken seriously.
I don't expect Flowers to grasp that because, again, she's had decades to grasp how her efforts have undercut one cause after another that she supported.
Could Julian Assange be a rapist? Of course he could. There's a talking head, Democrat, on TV these days -- back on TV -- who did a fade for about a decade because he raped a woman. He could have gone to prison but paid her off instead.
As late as 1999, I thought he was a wonderful guy. Yeah, I know him. He was always a gentleman around me but I didn't date him and I didn't drink with him. He raped a woman, now he's back on TV because he paid her off (and intimidated her).
So Julian's supporters need to grasp that anyone can be a rapist. If they can grasp that, they need to look at their own behavior.
Every time that they mock or trash or even negatively talk about those two women who may have been raped, it demonstrates to the public that they don't have compassion and that they really don't respect women. That's really not the message that his supporters need to be sending to the public.
Funny thing, before they went with that message? Julian Assange had support. Even after the rape charges, he had support. His public support only slipped and dropped after his supporters attacked those two women.
In the time since, you'll note, no new women have emerged. Because they're stupid. Michael Ratner can't even talk to women on his radio show with equality. But if I'd been on Team Julian (instead of Team Truth), I would've been saying, "Guys" because everyone else in the room would have been a man with two exceptions "we need to bring women in and we need to do it now. We need to bring in women so that we look women friendly. We need to do it before the hostility and misogny is next unleashed." It's been unleashed over and over.
It's too late for them now. But they should have. They should have had the brains to grasp that these snarling, angry men (Pilger, Ratner, McGovern, etc) denoucing the women didn't play well in public and that they needed public faces that didn't look like attackers.
Bradley Manning is not appearing before a European judge. He's appearing before a US military official. It would be really great if his case could be treated on its own merits and if it's appears to be one of those rare moments where he might actually get some attention, the Julian Assange Defense League could close their mouths long enough to let at least one important day -- like the 1,000 day? -- be about him.
There are about 70 e-mails in the inbox of the public e-mail saying something similar to what one woman wrote in response to our noting Bradley in two entries yesterday, "I know I should be more supportive but it's really hard for me to get too supportive when I see so many people trying to say that he and Julian Assange are the same. I also want nothing to do with those [censored] who attack the two rape victims."
Again there are about 70 e-mails that came in in the last 24 hours expressing that sentiment. Julian Assange supporters need to take a look at their actions.
(And, for the record, I agree with the word I censored - I use the word censored many times a day. But this is a work safe site and we can't have that word up here.)
It's over, I'm done writing songs about love
There's a war going on
So I'm holding my gun with a strap and a glove
And I'm writing a song about war
And it goes
Na na na na na na na
I hate the war
Na na na na na na na
I hate the war
Na na na na na na na
I hate the war
Oh oh oh oh
-- "I Hate The War" (written by Greg Goldberg, on The Ballet's Mattachine!)
The number of US service members the Dept of Defense states died in the Iraq War is [PDF format warning] 4488.
The e-mail address for this site is common_ills@yahoo.com.
iraq
i hate the war
the ballet
